Thursday, January 30, 2014

Poor Justin Bieber – ought one to describe
as poor someone so young, so rich, with
a world-wide following horde of screaming adoring fannettes? Alas, is it
yet another case of fame striking when too young and in consequence the lad
unable to cope going off the rails? Despite his adoring fans he seems with his
behaviour to have got up the nose with a number of folk who have been deriding
him both as a person and for his talent. For one thing it would seem there is a
deep suspicion, whatever the reason, that he is gay and won’t admit it. Well,
if that’s the case, who cares? Though the “girlie” tag isn’t exactly
flattering. Is he a boy or is he a girl? Is he Justin or is he Justine? If he
is gay and came out he would probably have another million fans. However,
whatever, whichever, it would seem fame has gone to his head as well as drugs
and haven’t we seen it all before? Having never heard him sing I wouldn’t know
if he is talented or not and despite Oscar Wilde’s adage that the only bad
publicity is no publicity there is a limit to be drawn before the crash comes.
Phew! What a collection of clichés.

“Money money money! Money makes the world
go round.” I wonder how many songs have
been written about money. Correct me if I’m wrong but I bet there hasn’t been
one about the adverse aspects of money apart from the itch to have it of
course. Well dip me in shit and candy me over as one of my students used to say,
whoever would have thought it? – “Cashgate,” the biggest financial scandal in Malawi's history,
has affected the country's relations with donors and caused outrage among
Malawians.

Allegations of the massive looting of
government money became public following the shooting of the finance ministry's
then budget director Paul Mphwiyo in September 2013.

Just days before, a junior civil servant
was allegedly found with bales of cash totalling more than $300,000 in the boot
of his car. So just tick off Malawi as yet another African country where billions
in foreign aid has been lining the pockets of crooked politicians and
government officials- that is if it isn’t being used to buy Kalashnikovs and
other essential military hardware to continue the seemingly never ending game
of my tribe is better than your tribe and my religion is better than yours,
while people living in justified terror are forced to flee their homes swelling
the world’s refugee crises. There are cities of opulence such as Abidjan, capital of the Cote D’voire with magnificent
hotels, five star restaurants and, when I was there, shops where women could
buy the latest Paris
fashions, luxury goods, and French patisserie was flown in fresh daily. But it
is surrounded, as so many major centres are, by slums and tin shanties and
further afield people sill live in mud huts as they have done for centuries;
have no access to clean water, electricity, hygienic facilities, and only the most
basic of medical aid, if that, and should the crops fail are likely to face starvation,
but western countries keep on sending aid which never reaches them. Colonialism
is history, Africa’s a big girl now; she must
stand on her own two feet, she can no longer blame the colonists for her
troubles. Those wily oriental gentlemen the Chinese have much the better idea,
instead of sending money to miraculously disappear they build railways, are
granted mining concessions, open any number of shops in which to sell cheap
Chinese goods etcetera which may help Africa somewhat but helps the Chinese more.

And now, alas, the news from South Africa,
the one country one felt might not go the same way, at least not quite so
quickly, has fallen into the same trap. Many years ago Alan Paton wrote a novel
about South Africa
called “Cry The Beloved Country.” It was a terrible time for the African and the
book, also adapted into film, television, and theatre, achieved great acclaim
but a book with the same title could be written now, though with a different
cry. “The tragedy is not that things are
broken. The tragedy is that things are not mended again.”

Monday, January 27, 2014

If you were a bank in serous trouble how
much would you think of paying your CEO? J.P.Morgan is the bank in question and
the lucky recipient of $20000000 is chief executive Jamie Dimon. Little wonder
that half the world’s wealth is in the hands of no more than 85 people. Is the
economic crises over then? Like hell it is and banks, despite being mainly the cause
of it all in the first place still, are glad-handing and paying out ridiculous bonuses
to people who obviously do not deserve them already having more money than they
need-far too much in fact and in a year when the bank’s income is down
substantially. Various scandals are involved of course but that’s banking,
who’s surprised?

Some HSBC customers have been prevented
from withdrawing large amounts of cash because they could not provide evidence
of why they wanted it.

They were stopped from withdrawing amounts
ranging from £5,000 to £10,000.

HSBC admitted it has not informed customers
of the change in policy, which was implemented in November.

Stephen Cotton, from Worcestershire, went
to his local HSBC branch this month to withdraw £7,000 from his instant access
savings account to pay back a loan from his mother.

A year before, he had withdrawn a larger
sum in cash from HSBC without a problem.

But this time it was different, He wrote to
complain to HSBC about the new rules and also that he had not been informed of
any change.

“When presented with the withdrawal slip,
they declined to give us the money because we could not provide them with a satisfactory
explanation as to what the money was for. They wanted a letter from the person
involved."

Mr Cotton says the staff refused to tell
him how much he could have: "So I wrote out a few slips. I said, 'Can I
have £5,000?' They said no. I said, 'Can I have £4,000?' They said no. And then
I wrote one out for £3,000 and they said, 'OK, we'll give you that.' "

He asked if he could return later that day
to withdraw another £3,000, but he was told he could not do the same thing
twice in one day. He wrote to complain to HSBC about the new rules and also
that he had not been informed of any change.

“As this was not a change to the Terms and
Conditions of your bank account we had no need to pre-notify customers of the
change”

Mr Cotton cannot understand HSBC's
autocratic attitude: "I've been banking in that bank for 28 years. They
all know me in there. You shouldn't have to explain to your bank why you want
that money. It's not theirs, it's yours."

Peter, from Wiltshire, had a similar
experience.

He wanted to take out £10 000 cash from
HSBC, some to pay to his sons and some to fund his long-haul travel plans.

Peter phoned up the day before to give HSBC
notice and everything seemed to be fine.

The next day he got a call from his local
branch asking him to pay his sons via a bank payment and to provide booking
receipts for his holidays. Peter did not have any booking receipts to show.

The following day he spoke to HSBC again
and this time, having examined his account, it said he could withdraw the
£10,000.

Belinda is another customer who was
initially denied her cash, in her case to pay her builder. She was told she had
to provide the builder's quote.

HSBC has said that following customer
feedback, it was changing its policy: "We ask our customers about the
purpose of large cash withdrawals when they are unusual and out of keeping with
the normal running of their account. Since last November, in some instances we
may have also asked these customers to show us evidence of what the cash is
required for."

"The reason being we have an
obligation to protect our customers, and to minimise the opportunity for
financial crime. However, following feedback, we are immediately updating
guidance to our customer facing staff to reiterate that it is not mandatory for
customers to provide documentary evidence for large cash withdrawals, and on
its own, failure to show evidence is not a reason to refuse a withdrawal. We
are writing to apologise to any customer who has been given incorrect
information and inconvenienced."

Other banks were asked other banks what
their policy is on large cash withdrawals.

They all said they reserved the right to
ask questions about large cash withdrawals.

But none of them said they would require
evidence of what the money was being used for before paying out.

Douglas Carswell, the Conservative MP for Clacton, is alarmed by the new HSBC policy: "All
these regulations which have been imposed on banks allow enormous
interpretation. It basically infantilises the customer. In a sense your money
becomes pocket money and the bank becomes your parent."

But Eric Leenders, head of retail at the
British Bankers Association, said banks were sensible to ask questions of their
customers: "I can understand it's frustrating for customers. But if you
are making the occasional large cash withdrawal, the bank wants to make sure
it's the right way to make the payment."

.

Staff have been informed it is not
mandatory for customers to provide documentary evidence for large cash
withdrawals, and on its own, failure to show evidence is not a reason to refuse
a withdrawal. We are writing to apologise to any customer who has been given
incorrect information and inconvenienced."

Douglas Carswell, the Conservative MP for Clacton, is alarmed by the new HSBC policy: "All
these regulations which have been imposed on banks allow enormous
interpretation. It basically infantilises the customer. In a sense your money
becomes pocket money and the bank becomes your parent."

Thursday, January 23, 2014

Wow! Seventy three pounds of marmalade all
labelled, and Douglas being Douglas they’re
not just your Tom, Dick and Harry of marmalades but come in any number of exotic
assorted flavours. The last half dozen jars are labelled Rahat Lakum flavoured
with rose liquor and parfait amour. And just n case it is thought extravagance
beyond belief the remains of the rose liquor has been lurking in a dark corner
of the booze cupboard since I bought it when first arriving in Crete when the
Greek currency was still the drachma. It was a very small hardware shop long since
closed down the owners (I never made out whether they were husband and wife or
brother and sister though she was a wee bit draconian in manner and he rather
timorous) being too old to carry on, in fact who must be dead by now or at least
in their late nineties. Can’t remember now how much that dusty old bottle cost but
it must have been pre-war. This was the lady who, when I went in to buy a
bucket said, “You want to buy Cuba?”
as I used the accent in the wrong place – koùvas/kouvàs. You have to be so
careful with accented languages.

Malàka certainly as a very different
meaning to malakà.

Parfait amour and coke used to be my
favourite tipple when I was at university until one night I got so legless on
it I never drank it again.

Anyway, since the discovery of home-made
fruit flavoured tsigouthia (raki) there’s been no more purchase of expensive
commercial liquors. And as for 73 jars of marmalade a lot of it will be given
away to friends, in fact the first six jars have already gone, in exchange for
some olive oil from those who produce their own. I can’t remember when last we
had to buy olive oil. I can’t remember whether I’ve said that before. I
probably have. Memory both short and long is virtually kaput these days.

So 73 jars of marmalade are all very well
but soon it will be apricot time and there is a glut every year. I’m informed
there are 36 one pound jars left and plenty more where they came from as there
is a shop in Rethymno that sells them very cheap. Apricots are a very versatile
fruit anyway: you can eat them straight off the tree and if they have been
standing in the sun the favour is wonderfully enhanced. You can make wine with
them, make jam with them, use them for puddings, dry them and freeze them for
winter use. But despite the myriad uses we put them to the ground beneath the
tree always ends up thick with dropped fruit. Such a waste. Same with the
prickly pear. Walking passed it late in the year you get the distinct whiff of
a brewery.

I have a feeling I might soon have to give
up Blogging on a regular basis, my fingers just can’t cope much longer with
typing. You’d be surprised how long it’s taken me to write this.

Monday, January 20, 2014

To-day’s Blog is not mine. A citizen of a
once beautiful and prosperous country by the name of Rhodesia wrote it to say how it is
now after more than seventeen years under the Presidency of Robert Mugabe and his
cronies. It is hardly an enviable record. If any of you have read this I
apologise but I felt it needed a wider

audience and Cathy has most kindly given me
permission to do so.

Dear Family and Friends,

> There's nothing quite like five days
without electricity to remind us

> how hard our lives were during the
first decade of the 21st century

> and to warn us how tenuous our grip on
normality is. The prolonged

> power cut in my neighbourhood left a
fridge full of mould and fruit

> flies, all the food on the compost
heap and tempers frayed to breaking

> point. Add a couple of days without
water to this picture and then

> decide whether to laugh or cry when
you read the message that comes in

> on the cell phone from the Ministry of
Health. 'Prevent diarrhoea this

> season,' it says, ' wash your hands
with soap or ash under safe

> running water before eating or
preparing food and after visiting the

> toilet.' Safe running water is a joke
when you haven't had any water

> for a couple of days; safe food is
absurd after five days without

> electricity and a fridge alive with
mould.

>

> As each month passes since the July
2013 elections it seems we could

> so easily slide back to the way things
were a decade ago and every day

> the press reports back up our fears. A
Ministry of Health whose

> hospitals owe US$36 million to
suppliers and yet who've only been

> allocated US$23 million in this year's
budget. A Ministry of Education

> which needs US$73 million to help
educate disadvantaged and vulnerable

> children but have only been allocated
US$15 million for the program.

>

> Meanwhile the 51% compulsory
indigenisation of privately owned

> businesses remains a looming threat
and there is no relief or clarity

> offered by authorities. The
uncertainty has left no one spending

> money, companies shrinking and more
and more workers being laid off.

> Fear of being targeted in the
indigenisation issue has left most

> affected people not prepared to speak
out, and not even prepared to

> publicise the absurd amounts of money
they're being told to pay.

> Some of these amounts include US$20 to
submit the mandatory

> indigenisation forms and then US$500
for born and resident Zimbabweans

> or US$5,000 for 'foreigners' to get a
'compliance certificate.' It's

> not clear what any of this money is
for, where it goes to, if it's a

> fee for not being black or if it's
going to prevent you from giving up

> 51% of your own company. It seems
beyond belief that people are being

> made to pay for the bureaucracy that
will facilitate them losing 51%

> of their own companies because of the
colour of their skin. Some

> 'indigenous' Zimbabweans seem to think
that the mandatory handing over

> of a 51% shareholding of a private
company is OK because they say the

> shares will be paid for. But does that
make it right you ask; being

> forced to cede the majority
shareholding of your own work? They have

> conveniently forgotten that farmers
who bought their farms after

> Independence
and then had them seized by the government, because of

> the colour of their skin, were
promised compensation for fixed assets

> but fourteen years later 95% of us
haven't ever received a single

> dollar for the expropriation of our
homes, businesses and life's work.

>
Trying to make sense of it all I stood outside under a stormy night

> sky looking for answers. Clouds boiled
overhead but every now and

> again the moon broke through. Almost
full, it shed its light on the

> branches of a big Musasa tree,
exposing for a moment a little grey

> owl. Querulous and quavering were the
best words I could find to

> describe its strange, haunting call.
It sounded so far away and was

> almost inaudible over the voices of a
million crickets but in fact the

I once heard someone many years go, about
to move to Rhodesia,
as it was called then, say “It’s the country off the future.” What future? I
shouldn’t think for a moment that Mugabe in his gilded palace gives a fig as he
certainly won’t be going without electricity and water. It could all have been
so different and my fears now are for South Africa where corrupt
politicians have been making themselves obscenely wealthy and Zuma is showing
all the signs of that megalomania to be witnessed in Robert Mugabe.

Thursday, January 16, 2014

Despite opposition and outrage from conservatives, a permit to kill a
rhino, one of only three permits issued yearly by Namibia, has been won at auction by
a Texan for the princely sum of $350000. One of the arguments against the
auction is that it might encourage other Americans who have that sort of money
to pay up and kill. The current winner says that the money will go towards
conservation (conservation of who I wonder) and that by killing an old bull
passed his prime, one that would be likely to attack younger ones still in the
sexual circuit, that also goes towards conservation. He could be right of
course. What do I know abut the sex-life of the rhino? How does one know when
one has passed his prime anyway? With the amount of poaching that seems to
increase year by year I would have thought even three kills three too many. You
would have thought with the advent of Viagra the horn worth $60000 a piece would
have become obsolete, especially as its magical qualities are a myth anyway.
The white rhino, of which only four remain in the entire world, is protected
24/7 by armed guards. Soon, guard or no guard, the rhino will pass into history
like the unicorn. Oh, yes, didn’t you know? Once upon a time there were
unicorns. Any child will tell you that and the Bible mentions them four times
so there must have been. Probably left behind when Noah put up the “No
Vacancies” sign or didn’t realise they hadn’t turned up.

Why is the swastika still with us
and all the paraphernalia of pseudo mystic masculinity, the ubermensch, white
supremacy that goes with far right thinking?? Why is so much still published and
why the continued fascination on the life of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party
who were nothing but a bunch of malformed, some physically, some mentally or
emotionally, thieving thugs? YouTube has
any number of films, videos, showing every aspect of this period including not
only the horrors of all out war but the obscene horrors of what the Nazis
perpetrated, not only to the Jews, homosexuals and Gypsies in the concentration
camps but wherever they were the conqueror. Is it merely the desire to
have or to show superiority where none exists? Is it a matter of jealousy? With
the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin it was necessary to clean up the city, removing
anti-Semitism signs before foreign visitors arrived and Hitler was non too
pleased when the supreme athlete, Jesse Owens, turned out to be a black
American, and racism, it might be obvious to say it, still seems to be the
basis of the neo-Nazi mentality, especially in America. Here in Greece our
neo-Nazis, the party known as Golden Dawn are also racist but for them it is
anybody who isn’t Greek. It follows the same old pattern of a pseudo-military
aspect and discipline with flags showing their party symbol – not quite a
swastika but it doesn’t take too much imagination to know what it means, intimidation
and brutality. Stall holders of obvious foreign origin have been beaten up and
their stalls destroyed. In America,
a Neo-Nazi by the name of Craig Cobb, evidently from a wealthy background tried
to take over the sleepy town of Leith,
North Dakota, where he had been taking over properties to be distributed to his
followers. He apparently expected residents to bow to the new order. He was
wrong. In November, Cobb and a henchman swaggered through the town carrying
shotguns and shouting obscenities. Alarmed locals called police. Both men are
now in custody each facing terrorism charges and lengthy prison sentences.
Nothing to be ashamed of, Mr. Cobb, you are merely following in your mentor’s
footsteps though it would seem his padded cell was a bit more padded than is usual.

Monday, January 13, 2014

The question of euthanasia, like the death sentence is certainly
a thorny one for many people. In the UK sufferers desperate to end their pain
have gone to law only to have their plea consistently refused, the reason given that it would be open to
misuse; but then isn’t everything? I for one believe, despite the doubts as to
possibly evil intent, that for humane reasons alone euthanasia should be legal
and it surely can’t be long before it is. One hears tales of caring doctors who
surreptitiously end patients’ lives when living for them has become a
nightmare; despite the chance that in so doing they could face an accusation of
murder. I would like to think that should life become unbearable I could be
painlessly sent off into oblivion. It can be done. Switzerland,
Holland allow it and Belgium made euthanasia legal in
2002. Now there are even discussions as to its availably for children. When
many countries have come to the conclusion that euthanasia is sometimes the
kindest course to take the UK will still be dithering with various factions maintaining
life is precious and to end it before its natural time is both sinful of at
least immoral. Suicide is no longer a crime, isn’t euthanasia the next step?

Weather records have been broken across North America, with Canada and all 50 US states experiencing freezing
temperatures.

In Kentucky, an escaped
prisoner turned himself in to get out of the cold while at least one polar bear
at a zoo in Chicago
had to be taken inside because of the plummeting temperatures.

ABC news correspondent Linzie Janis, in Buffalo
in New York,
told BBC News the area looked like a series of ghost towns with roads littered
with overturned cars.

In Ohio
worried residents took in dogs with frozen paws and people were warned that below
a certain temperature the skin on their face could freeze.

This reminds me of stories one heard about prisoners in
Soviet Siberian work camps who had to suffer amputation of the penis because
their urine froze. True or false I’ve sometimes wondered how the Eskimo manages
not only to urinate but defecate when a certain expanse of the body has to be
exposed to the elements.

We cannot say we weren't warned. Most of us were born
into a world containing antibiotics, so it is easy to feel they are permanent
fixtures in the arsenal of medicines. In fact penicillin did not go into
widespread use until the 1950s. But according to scientists and medical
personal at the topmost level the golden age of antibiotics is coming to an end
unless urgent action is taken. The growing threat of antibiotic resistant
organisms: bacteria viruses and parasites is once again in the spotlight.The
warnings actually started many years ago, more than five years for example when
a strain of tuberculosis in South
Africa became immune to the drugs. Whereas
antibiotics have been around for less than a century, infectious agents are
older than humanity, and are continually evolving.

There has also been an alarming increase in rates of the
sexually transmitted disease gonorrhea, which is becoming more difficult to
treat.

Drug companies are in it for profit so they can't be
expected to spend billions and years inventing new antibiotics on which they'll
never be able to recoup their investment; but the price of some modern drugs is
already reaching astronomical proportions and perhaps the companies may be
persuaded to go back to the lab. Medical advance simply has to keep up if
possible with the evolution of other species or we might as well all just give
up.

For thousands of years the Chinese, adept in the fine art of
torture, held executions with the “death a thousand cuts,” an excruciatingly
painful and slow way to die, the pain sometimes accentuated by the administration
of certain drugs.

According to a report in a Chinese newspaper Kim Jong Un,
beloved leader of North Korea has had his uncle and five accomplices executed
by being thrown to 120 ravenous dogs that had not been fed for three days. Says
everything you need to know about North Korea.

In Afghanistan
an eleven year old girl was strapped with explosives and ordered by her family
to go and blow up a police check-point. She is now in protective custody which
tells you everything you need to know about the religion of peace.

Thursday, January 9, 2014

Have
watched “Star Trek” 1 and 2 with the original cast and enjoyed them so the Christmas
present wasn’t misjudged. Also watched “Private Schultz,” BBCTV (1981) at its
very best, with Michael Elphick and the brilliant Ian Richardson absolutely superb
as Major Neuheim plus a few smaller parts ending with a one liner, the very
last line in the six part one hour series: “Your change, sir.” Not an inflexion wrong, not a gesture wrong, not
a note wrong, not an expression wrong, an absolute gem of a performance
achieving that wonderful outcome of being both hilarious yet at the same time a
real person rather than a two dimensional comic. Hats off too to Jack Pulman,
most famous probably for his adaptation of “I Claudius,” for his scripts of
“Private Schultz.” He died young (54) before he could see his work. I feel sure
he would have been more than pleased with the final result. Not all of us can
have that sort of talent but what a loss when you see some of the dross TV puts
out. Words of praise too for Mr. Elphick, also for the direction by Bob Chetwyn
who, when he was artistic director at Ipswich,
directed the very first play of mine produced, “Oh Brother.” Over the years I
sometimes wondered what had happened to him since then so was delighted to note
his credit here and learn something of his career up to that point as discussed
in the “extras.”

If it is true, and I have no reason to doubt
it, that there are only eight basic stories and the rest is all variation and embellishment
a good example is the series “24” starring Keifer Sutherland. We have started
to watch it a second time and have seen the first four in all of which the
basic plot is a terrorist threat to America: an attempted assassination of the
president, an unknown deadly virus, a dirty bomb, a stolen nuclear missile, and
agent Jack Bauer there to sort out every one, with some assistance of course, but mainly through individual heroics. Exciting stuff, each hour ending in a
cliff-hanger. The series is franchised under the wing of 20th Century Fox. I
wonder if the writers have ever been paid all that is due to them.

Been a wee
bit disappointed in the last two episodes of “Golden Girls.” Temporarily out of ideas? They’ve gone from
reality to fantasy and once truth or naturalism if you rather gets kicked aside
it is difficult to stay with it. Like hey! We’re stuck here, dream sequence
come to the rescue. Okay, all the gags are still there but that is all they
are, gags. They don’t come out of a natural situation. For example, it’s
Christmas time and Blanche brings a new found conquest back to the house. He is
wearing a Santa Claus costume and Rose immediately flies at him accusing him of
dereliction of duty. He should be out and about doing what Santa Claus is meant
to do. Now this is not said in jest. In fact the attack is quite vituperate and
suspension of disbelief goes out the widow because Rose might be a wee but slow
on the uptake but she is certainly not that stupid. All her herring and down on
the farm stories are wonderfully humorous and ripe for send-up though she doesn’t
realise it but this kind of threatening behaviour is out of character and an immediate
cut-off.

Last Sunday
Papa Spiros came around once again (Epiphany?) to bless the house. My timing
was unfortunate because I was in the loo so missed out but Chris and Douglas
were well sprayed with holy water and basil. Papa Spiros is very young and, to
use Noel Coward’s favourite words of approval, very sweet. He is about to
become a father for the second time, hoping it will be a boy. Though we are not
Orthodox or members of his congregation (not even Christian for that matter) he
is well aware of it. He even went especially to visit Douglas
in hospital but unlike the Mormons and Seventh Day Adventists he doesn’t try
ramming religion down your throat. So, if blessing our house means something to
him, we wouldn’t dream of denying him.

A group, The New York-based SatanicTemple, has unveiled designs for a
7-foot-tall statue of Satan that it wants erected at the Oklahoma state Capitol. The statue features
a goat-headed Satan sitting in a throne with children either side. The Satanic
Temple spokesman says Oklahoma's decision to put a Ten Commandments monument at
the Capitol opened the door for its statue, he says it's moving forward with
plans despite the Oklahoma Capitol Preservation Commission's decision to place
a moratorium on new requests.

The commission says it's waiting until a lawsuit over the
Ten Commandments has been settled

Monday, January 6, 2014

Panos Karnezis is a Greek writer who writes
quite brilliantly in English. The first book of his I read is called “Little
Infamies” and I loved it. I enjoyed it so much that I went on to read his novel
“The Maze” and was so intrigued and taken with the story I decided, just for the
sheer joy of it, to write a full length screenplay without even thinking of
such things as film rights or whether a film would ever be made. At the time
that didn’t seem important. I just wanted to reproduce this wonderful story in
my own way and in my own style in a different medium, just to write about all
these intriguing characters., so human yet so wonderfully theatrical at the
same time.

The synopsis on the book cover reads – “Set
in Anatolia in 1922 The Maze is the story

Of a retreating Greek brigade that has lost
its way. It is pursued by a Turkish army that seeks to avenge three years of Greek
occupation. No help is forthcoming. Commanded by a brigadier with a passion for
Greek mythology and morphia, the brigade’s only chance of salvation is to reach
the Mediterranean coast and sail home

As the army wanders through the Anatolian desert,
their internal divisions become more pronounced and their dementia more florid.
Eventually they reach a small town, up until now untouched by the war, which is
run by a simple minded mayor and peopled by a gallery of wonderfully strange characters.
When the soldiers leave at last, a tragedy has taken place and the town has
changed forever.”

A synopsis simply cannot give justice to
the depth of this adventure and the characters involved: the brigadier himself,
the corporal in love he thinks with a girl in Thessaloniki who he has never met
and whose letters he cherishes not knowing his beloved is a middle-aged bearded
communist trying to convert him to the cause,

the aide-de-camp who is also a secret
communist, the chaplain with his pet dog who has to beg oil from the cook to light his votive lamps, the upper
class airman who crash- lands close to the regiment’s camp and whose actions unintentionally
lead to two deaths, the overworked medic, the florid French opera-singing whore
who the mayor hopes to marry much to the disgust of the local schoolteacher who
wants her for himself and feels stabbed in the back by a one time friend, the
stray horse that shits its way to the town thus leading the soldiers to it and
has, with the mayor and dignitaries and at
the mayor’s insistence, have its photograph taken by a correspondent who just
happens to have a camera.

The boy scouts who, as they march out of town
and out of step, are heard singing Greece shall never die.

My screenplay is full of directions as to
how I would shoot the film if I were directing it. I can see it so clearly in
my mind’s eye, frame by frame. Another director would of course ignore my suggestions
and go his own way.

Mr. Panos’ story would make a wonderful
major motion picture and is too good to be wasted. Has no one in the business
thought of it? If not, why not?

If ever it is made into a film, knowing how
long these things take, I doubt I’ll be around to see it, which is a matter for
regret.

Thursday, January 2, 2014

The floor
of the courtyard is littered with oranges fallen before their time and the tree
is still laden, as is the tree in the lower garden, and a couple of days ago Douglas
had a field day resulting in seventeen pounds of mandarin marmalade. I would
have preferred less marmalade and some mandarins just to eat but he cleared the
tree except for half a dozen he couldn’t reach. We’ve had so much rain recently
I must remind them to take a look at the avocados.

Well, or
lipon as the Greeks say, here we are into 2014. As usual we didn’t stay up to
watch the festivities on television. The last time Douglas and I celebrated New
Year was a few years back when we were in Athens
and part of the milling throng shoulder to shoulder in Kotsia Square, bands playing and at the
countdown the sky ablaze with exploding fireworks. Pickpockets must have thought all their
birthdays had come at once though fortunately we weren’t tagged. One might have
been given a quick brush-by but having suffered from these buggers before we
made sure there was nothing to pick – nothing easily accessible anyway. A case
of once bitten twice shy, or more accurately twice bitten. It’s amazing though
how careless some people can be. I was sitting one day on one of the stone
benches at Ommonia outside my favourite restaurant, “Neon” and I noticed a
young guy who turned out to be Australian with knapsack a couple of benches off
and a big, fat, juicy wallet stuck invitingly out of his back trouser pocket so
I took it on myself to warn him of the danger.
Five minutes later he left with that big fat juicy wallet still there but
not for much longer I reckoned.

I wonder if
there was much to celebrate in Athens
this time around and when, if ever, this recession is going to come to an end.
For many Greeks 2014 is not going to be a good year, for so many struggling to
keep their heads above water a loss in their pensions will be the last straw. Perhaps
the politicians would like to tell them what they will have to live on. Here on
Crete a group of ex-pats have formed a charity
called “Helping Hand” to distribute food to families in need. In Athens the fascist party Golden
Dawn is also distributing food but only to those who can produce Greek ID.

A petition
has been started requesting the Greek government do something about saving
Crete’s ancient olive trees, some of them hundreds of years old and being indiscriminately chopped down to
provide firewood for those who simply can’t afford to heat their homes any other
way. As the petitioner has it – “These trees helped our parents put
clothes on our backs and send us to university. It is thanks to these trees
that Crete is what it is. Its cultural
development is thanks to them.
Yet no one cares for these olive trees that have fed millions of people for thousands
of years that have been worshipped and adored. These trees are our legacy.” She
could have added “our livelihood.” Unfortunately I doubt the government can or
will do anything about it.

So what would I hope for in 2014? Apart from the obvious
like religious contention resulting only too often in violence, I would like
there to be more awareness of human cruelty to animals, perhaps starting off
with a complete worldwide banning of vivisection, the closing of zoos not up to
a certain standard of welfare and a blitz on those promoting dog-fights: for
this disgusting phenomenon a lengthy prison sentence, a hefty fine and the
prohibition of keeping an animal for life.

There are so many many things one could wish for
to make this world a better place but as the old saying has it, “If wishes were
horses beggars would ride,” and all the prayers and wishing in the end isn’t
gong to change a damn thing. Happy new year anyway.

About Me

Ex actor, ex director, still a writer, prose now no longer plays. Like the Godfather growing tomatoes. No, too old to garden but still writing - my autobiography No Official Umbrella - same title as my Blogs and soon to come out in paperback, novels and of course my favorite detective Thornton King